


So You've Been Turned Into a Re-Animated Robot, Now What?

by CompletelyDifferent



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: AU, F/M, Julia's a robot now BEEP BEEP, there are other minor canon ships but not worth tagging
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-31
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-05-16 11:01:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14810094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CompletelyDifferent/pseuds/CompletelyDifferent
Summary: When the robot JU-L1A meets the adventurer Magnus Burnsides, both feel a weird sense of familiarity. Then they remember: oh, right, they're married. What a weird world, huh?Now the couple has to adjust to being reunited after years apart, Julia's new mechanical body, and the question of 'what's the truth about these Relics, anyway?'





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Saw [this post](https://mcgonagollygee.tumblr.com/post/165985022462/mcgonagollygee-an-adventure-zone-au-where-in-the) on Tumblr a couple of months ago, and it inspired me. Thanks to mcgonagollygee for the fun premise of a universe where Julia gets to come back from the dead and engage in Shenanigans. 

They meet in a laboratory that’s threatening to transform the whole world into crystal. He’s a warrior sent in to save the planet. She’s a sentient robot and marvel of engineering.

She introduces herself as JU-L1A, and Magnus says that he used to know someone with a similar name.

He thinks there’s something familiar about her beyond that. Her accent, perhaps, or the warmth in her mechanical smile, or how she’s such a total badass. JU-L1A too, thinks there’s something familiar about him, but she can’t pinpoint anything specific. And how could there be? She’s only a few months old, and has never left the lab.

Besides, there’s not a lot of time for introspection and soul searching with a clock ticking down to the apocalypse, so neither of them dwell.

* * *

Then it slots into place: she’s not an AI. She’s a human soul, placed in a robot body. She can remember things. The taste of fresh warm bread; grains of wood under hand; the thick scent of burning; terror as her body fell and fell and fell--

Magnus pats her on the back, and tells her it’ll be alright.

* * *

Later, after the battle has been one and the day has been saved, begins the debate with Kraavtiz the Reaper about life, and death, and the blurry spaces in between. Miraculously, JU-L1A (is that even her name?) is allowed to stay on the Prime Material Plane.

A second chance. She’s been given a second chance. She can barely remember her first, but she’s going to make this count.

Kravitz, however, cannot stay. As he tears open a portal to the afterlife, Magnus says, “Tell Julia I love her.”

“Which Julia?” asks Kravtiz.

“Uh,” Magnus stammers, “Julia Burnsides--”

“Tell her yourself,” Kravtiz says, smiling despite his skull face, and pointing at the robot-ghost.

And Julia remembers everything.

* * *

After the shock and the crying and the hugs are done, the pair laugh, trying to brush it all off as if they just happened to meet while out running errands.

“So you live on the moon now, huh?” Julia says, her sarcasm not quite able to hide the delight in her voice.

“Yeah. It’s pretty great,” says Magnus. “Wait till you see it! All futuristic Epcot domes, we’ve got our own spa, and pottery place, and a training dojo...”

“How many dogs?” Julia jokes.

Magnus goes dead serious. “Would you believe: not a single solitary one.”

* * *

While she refused to let it show (something much easier without a human face), Julia thinks this whole Bureau of Balance thing seems a bit sketch, and not just because of the lack of dogs. A secret headquarters on the moon? Magical bracers no one can remove? Wiping the entire world’s memories?

She doesn’t need to drink the void fish’s ichor. Isn’t capable of it, as a matter of fact, without a digestive system. But her undead mind remembers everything now. The relic wars. The terror of knowing that one day, without warning, your home could be destroyed by a conjured beast, or sudden earthquake, or simply go up in flames.

(Or, something far more mundane, like a tyrant with a grudge. No mind consuming artefacts needed for _that_.)

Still. She’d lost a cousin in the Wars. For years, she’d thought it had been an ordinary avalanche... in Neverwinter. Where, as the name suggests, it _never snows_.

So yeah. This memory stuff is powerful. What _else_ could it have done?

* * *

Despite her misgivings, The Director seems nice enough (”Lucretia,” Magnus tries to whisper in her ear/sound reciever, but his voice is loud enough for the whole room to hear).

More than just ‘nice’, in fact. The Director’s smile when she greets Julia is genuinely warm, her handshake firm, and there’s some emotion in her voice that Julia can’t quite parse when she says, “It is _such_ a pleasure to meet you.”

Magnus’s other moon friends are nice too, but in a less weird way. Carey is sharp as a whip, while Killian is gruff but warm. It’s sweet to see such young love. Avi’s good for a laugh. Angus McDonald is an absolute _sweetheart_.

He reminds Julia, with a pang, how they’d always planned to have kids eventually. But Magnus seems to have taken to the boy detective, so maybe it’s all worked out okay after all.

And then there’s Taako and Merle. Magnus’s new team. They’re loud and sarcastic and abrasive. Maybe they’re a titch too mean to the kid, and their jokes have a habit of going a little too far… but Julia can’t help but like them. Because they make Magnus so _happy_. The man positively beams when he’s with them.

Heck, they even get those baffling references Magnus makes sometimes, the ones nobody else understands. They make the same kinds of baffling comments themselves. The three of them will laugh their head off at a joke that nobody else gets, and Julia will chuckle too, just out of the sheer joy of sharing.

* * *

That first night on the moon, Julia and Magnus lie in bed together. Her new body is big and clunky and hard, and isn’t the right shape for cuddling at all, but Magnus still does.

They talk and they talk and they talk. They cry for Steven, for their lost friends, for Raven’s Roost. Then they fall asleep in each others’ arms.

 


	2. Chapter 2

They settle into a routine, re-building their life together on the Moon Base. It’s awkward and strange, sometimes (a lot of the time), but the two of them wouldn’t have gotten married if they didn’t think they could handle something hiccups like death-and-implantation-into-a-robot-body.

They visit Julia’s grave. Magnus’s watches her worriedly the whole time. Julia runs her fingers over the woodwork. Then she laughs and compliments the flowers he’d carved into it, just so he’ll know she’s okay.

They visit Raven’s Roost. Neither of them laughs there.

They go on day trips to other places, places they’d never gone before. Travel is so much easier when you don’t have a shop to keep, and magical pods that can drop you anywhere in the world.

Some people boggle at the robot, but most are too polite to comment. One does anyway, in Goldcliff, but Taako rises to Julia’s defense surprisingly quickly with a long insult that involves three variations of the word ‘fuck’.

So they visit carpentry shops, take Angus out for ice cream, help Carey and Killian choose wedding outfits, and take some pottery classes. It’s nice.

But then the Bureau of Balance finds a mysterious time bubble.

* * *

“I’m going with them,” Julian announces.

The Director’s gaze is steel. “No.”

“You don’t get to make that decision for her!” Magnus says, crossing his arms.

“I get to make the decision of which of my _employees_ go on which missions,” The Director says. “What level are you now, Magnus?”

“... Ten,” Magnus grinds out reluctantly.

The Director turns to Julia. “And you?”

“Not a spring chicken,” Julia informs her. She might be a carpenter by trade, but she fought in the rebellion just like Magnus.

“What is your level your _level_?” The Director presses, and then says herself, “I judge you to be a... four, five? We have no idea what’s waiting on the other side of this mission—”

“So it might be a real pushover!” interjects Merle.

“Y-yeah,” Taako says, through barely restrained snickers. “Maybe— maybe it’ll just be, hugs and singing kumbaya and watching Teletubbies.”

Julia has no idea what ‘teletubbies’ is, but it doesn’t matter. If she had a face it would be flushing with embarrassment and rage, hating how much Magnus grew and learned while she was gone, hating to think she might just slow him down—

“Regardless, this is more than levels,” The Director says, softer. “It’s the relics’ thrall. For some reason, the boys have been the only ones capable of resisting them. If you get caught in it, I don’t want to put them in a situation where—”

She breaks off, averting her eyes.

There’s another five minutes of arguing about it, but Julia’s heart isn’t in it. She can tell the decision has already been decided.

* * *

As they make their way to the hangar after the boys took a freaking _half hour_ to buy _shorts_ , Merle hangs back, pulling Julia aside.

“I know it sucks,” he says. “But.... maybe it’s for the best. Anyone can see, losing you again— it’d kill Magnus.”

Internally, Julia bristles, but she can tell the cleric meant well. She says, “Thanks.”

* * *

Waiting outside the time bubble is agony. Julia paces and paces. Once or twice Avi tries to engage her in conversation, but quickly realises it’s hopeless. He gives her what’s supposed to be reassuring smile, and then falls into silent vigil.

Julia keeps pacing

She casts Detect Magic, hoping it will let her see through the bubble. It doesn’t, remaining as opaque and impenetrable as ever. Instead, she catches a red flicker out of the corner of her vision—

Turning her head casually, she sees a floating red shape in the vague shape of a person. She tenses. Eyes narrowing, out of the corner of her mouth she mutters, “What are you?”

The shape recoils a little. In a booming voice it somehow whispers, “ **YOU CAN SEE ME?** ”

Julia rolls high on her arcana check. Recognising this thing as a lich, decides it’s best to play close to the vest. No need for it to know how exactly she can sense it. “I’m undead too,” she tells it.

The shape nods, buying her bluff. A very weird gesture from someone who doesn’t even have a proper face.

She’d been told the story of the Red Robes. The horrors they unleashed upon the world. Spells dance in Julia’s mind. Her hand itches to grab her knife, even though she knows it won’t touch the being’s spectral form. She could scream for Avi if she needs back-up, but... Liches are serious, high level necromancy. If things turn sour, how much can he really help?

“ **WHO ARE YOU**?” the lich asks. A pleasant change from ‘ _what_ are you’, which is what Julia usually gets from strangers these days.

“Julia Burnsides.”

The Red Robe jerks back in— surprise? Damn, Julia r _eally_ wishes they had a face to read. “W-well then,” they said after a moment, their voice suddenly sounding like... just a normal guy’s. “Julia, huh? It’s— well. What, what a pleasure it is to get to meet you.”

The echo of The Director’s words makes Julia pause. The same sort of emotion is in them too. Something pained and happy at the same time.

“Who are _you_?” she demands.

“A friend of your husband’s.”

Julia’s ‘eyebrows’ fly up. “He’s never mentioned you.”

The Red Robe laughs. It’s not a pleasant sound; cat claws on a blackboard. “ **HE WOULDN’T HAVE**.”

Julia glances at Avi. He’s far enough away, focused enough on the dome, that he hasn’t even noticed her speaking to seemingly thin air. She turns back to the Red Robe and rests her hands on her metal hips. “Proof, then, if you want me to believe you.”

“ **I CAN’T**.”

Rolling her eyes is a challenge without actual eye sockets, but Julia manages.

“ **I WANT TO** ,” they say. “ **BUT INFORMATION IS DANGEROUS. THERE ARE THINGS PEOPLES’ MINDS CANNOT PROCESS—** ”

“The void fish, yeah. I’m immune—”

“ **BECAUSE YOU’RE DEAD. YES. I’M AWARE.** ” A flicker of sarcasm in the lich’s voice. “ **BUT MAGNUS AND THE OTHERS ARE NOT. IF YOU TRY TO TELL THEM BEFORE THEY ARE READY, THEIR MINDS MAY BREAK UNDER THE STRAIN. THEY COULD LASH OUT, MAKE A MISTAKE WITHOUT REALISING. AND THEN THIS WORLD, AND ALL OTHERS, WILL BE LOST.** ”

“Right. Well.” Julia isn’t buying this for a second, but _whatever_ the Red Robe’s deal is, she wants to figure it out. “If the stakes are that high, I won’t do anything stupid. Long as I have proof.”

The Red Robe regards her. For a moment, she gets the impression of glasses beneath their hood.

“ **PHANDALIN** ,” they say at last. “ **NEXT TUESDAY, NOON. I’LL EXPLAIN EVERYTHING.** ”

A moment later, a hole pops open in the bubble, Magnus and the boys stumbling out. Magnus rushes to embrace Julia, the other two go to ask Avi something—

And time stops.

Julia gets to witness The Red Robe’s conversation with the boys. Asking if they trust him. Burning up into pained lightning when they say no, they don’t. Calling out to someone or something called ‘Lup’.

Then the lich disappears, leaving Julia with a lot to think about.

* * *

The afternoon that follows is pleasant, in the oddest of ways. Watching a whole town grow and live, meeting Magnus’s new friends. Taako and Merle and Magnus boast about saving time itself, and it’s entertaining. Hearing about their many deaths, less so. It probably would have been more Hearing disturbing if Julia hadn’t done the same thing about her own resurrection. It’s not something anyone would want to dwell on.

It’s a little more worrying, hearing them brush off those giant patches of static in their memory.

That night, while they get ready in their room, Magnus’s public bravado fades a bit. “The Chalice tried to get me. Said I could give you your body back. Make it so you never lost it.” He laughs. “I told it to get fucked. I’ve got _you_ , who cares about that old body?”

Julia laughs too, and pecks her metal mouth against his cheek.

Magnus is shaking.

“Was that... that wrong?” he asks. “I— it’s not just you. All of Raven’s Roost... Your, your _dad_ , Julia, I could have saved your dad—”

Julia freezes.

Memories rise up. Thick smells of polish and saw dust, warm steady hands, bad jokes, his homemade casseroles, his complete lack of fashion sense.

She knows, in that moment, that if she had gotten her hands on that cup, she would have brought her father back. Would not have even hesitated.

But she says, “You made the right choice. Rewriting time... things could have gotten real bad, real quick.”

“Y-yeah.” He leans into her metal carapace, and as gently as possible, Julia squeezes him.

He’s still shaking. Julia asks, “Magnus— is there something else—?”

Mutely, he shakes his head. Gets up. Grabs something out of his bag. Hands it to her.

Julia studies the papers carefully. A drawing of Magnus, younger, but clearly recognisable. Dressed in a red robe.

She recalls when she first met Magnus. A disoriented man who’d stumbled into Raven’s Roost with a scorching headache and seemingly no memory of how he’d got there. She’d joked about him having a bit too wild a night, and he’d chuckled, and they’d all just accepted that must have been what had happened. There’d always been gaps in his past, but nothing _too_ odd, and anyway, they’d just wanted to focus on the future.

But.

“Magnus,” she says. “Does this— does that mean you’re— you were a red robe?”

Her husband stares at her. His brow creases, in confusion, in pain. “I-”

“Do you remember this at all?” Julia says, pointing at the picture.

A choked sound comes out of Magnus’s throat. He clutches his head.

‘ _Their minds may break under the strain._ ’

Terror shoots through her. She rolls up the paper, hides it from sight. Goes to help Magnus up, asking, “Are you okay— are you okay—?”

“I— I’m fine.” He blinks at her. “Just— a migraine, or something, I guess. I’ll go grab a fantasy Tylenol. What— what were we talking about?”

“Nothing,” Julia lies.

She takes the scroll.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This got a much bigger reaction than I was expecting, ha! I guess folks are really there for happy Magnus, huh? Anyway, hope you're enjoying it, and thanks for the support :)


	3. Chapter 3

The next few days pass as if absolutely nothing has changed. They’re paid for a successful mission (Julia as well, even though she didn’t actually do anything). Some of it goes towards a Splurge at Fantasy Costco, while some of it gets tucked away into their savings. Magnus and Julia have had long talks about what they’ll do ‘After’. About reopening the shop, one way or another, and that takes planning.

Not that there’s much time for talking. The Director insists, almost immediately, that the “Tres Horny Boys” ( _how_ is that their new group name?) ramp up their training. Julia tries to join in… but almost immediately finds herself outpaced. It chafes to admit it, but this level of magic and combat is still just beyond her.

(“He had an extra three years,” Julia reminds herself, and does her best to believe it.)

So instead of training with her husband, she has sessions with other team members. Avi’s a good guy to spend time with. Friendly, easy going, but able of pushing Julia to the level that she wants, needs.

When she’s sparring, Julia sits with Angus in the library and listens to him chatter about his books.

She plays cards, and sometimes, manages to catch Carey at cheating. Sometimes actually manages to _beat_ the dragon-born.

Taako gives her some fashion tips, suggesting accessories that will actually look good on her blocky, metallic body.

Julia gets into a long conversation about different kinds of trees and wood with Merle, only to quickly withdraw when she realises that when he calls mahogany ‘beautiful’, he means it in a very different way than she does.

She plays a game of chess with Davenport, of all people, who despite barely being able to talk and having the social awareness of a gecko, proves to actually be a very competent player.

And all of that feels so _normal_. But that in itself feels like a lie, because at the back of her mind is a million questions, and a clock constantly counting down to Tuesday.

Julia has to sneak around and come up with excuses to justify why she needs a shuttle to Phandalin. It grates at her to be so dishonest, especially to Magnus. But she needs to get answers. For both of them.

At the edge of a perfect glass circle that used to be a town, the Red Robe greets her. They-- or he, seems to be a man-- says his name is Barry Bluejeans, and leads the way. He floats above the ground, but as a ranger, Julia has no difficulty keeping up, even over tricky terrain. She watches the path carefully, making sure she remembers the exact way back, in case she needed to escape.

‘Escape’ being the first thing that jumps into her mind when she’s brought to a _cave_ , with a _body_ floating in a _glowing tank_.

“No! Don’t worry!” the lich says, in his normal voice. “It’s not-- that’s just me, okay! I’m growing myself a new body, it’s soulless, when it’s ready I’ll just pop in and--”

“Why do you need a _new body_?” Julia demands, to keep herself of from running.

“To get onto the Moon Base, for one. Anti-Lich warding. And for two, to help hide from Reapers. This universe has a serious necromancy stigma.”

There’s a lot to unpack there, but... “This universe?”

And Bluejeans tells her everything.

* * *

When Julia returns to the Moon Base that night, she feels like she’s in a daze. She sits at a table in the mess hall as everyone enjoys a meal she can’t share, staring across at Magnus, her husband.

He eats his curry in huge gulps. Laughs at some comment Taako makes. Flings some peas in Merle’s direction, who fires back. Tries to pickpocket something off of Carey when she passes, only to get a palmful of pudding.

He’s such a goofball.

How much of that is real? If Bluejeans is to be believed, he spent a century fighting a war against some unfathomable eldritch being. Travelling across universes, witnessing cultures and sights Julia can barely imagine. Dying, being reborn. Losing almost everyone, year after year after year.

He’s one hundred and thirty four. Julia is either thirty two or thirty five, depending on whether you count those years she was dead.

“You okay, Jules?” Magnus says, waving a hand in front of her face.

“I-- yeah.”

She’s not. She’s not at all, and a tiny, selfish part of her wishes she’d never spoken to that lich.

* * *

But she did, and now she has no choice but to figure out the truth.

She pokes around, chats with people, trying to confirm the history of the Beauro of Balance. Angus McDonald gives her an entire thirty-minute lecture about it. He’s been researching it himself, it seems. He adjusts his glasses and says, “It’s full of mysteries.”

Angus is a smart, smart kid, and Julia wishes she could recruit him as help. But he’s too close to the Director. She doesn’t know if she can trust him.

Julia fabricates a reason to get a private hearing with the Director in her office. Something about rescinding the No Dogs rule. She barely hears Lucretia’s polite explanation for why that’s not possible. With Detect Magic on, she can see the illusion on top of The Director’s portrait, and with her undead eyes, she can see the true photograph beneath. Seven people dressed in red, all smiling.

Yep. It’s true.

Julia spends that night walking aimlessly across the Moonbase campus, mulling over Barry explanation on how he plans to break into the Director’s office. She wonders if she’s high level enough to execute it herself, or if she should wait for Barry to regrow his body like he wants. And as she walks past the Chug ‘N Squeeze, something bright catches her eye. She spins to see a fireball go shooting up into the sky.

The source of the flare was Taako, talking to a skeleton in a black coat. Julia’s blood, if she had any, would have run cold at the sight of the Reaper who nearly took her back to the Astral Plane.

From afar, she watches him and Taako in urgent conversation. Nothing bad seems to come of it, though. Kravitz leaves through a portal, while Taako, for some reason, methodically continues to lay out every object in his pockets on the ground.

Carefully, Julia trundles over. “What was that all about?”

“None of your beeswax, bubbelah,” says Taako, inspecting a half-eaten chocolate bar.

“If you’re going to throw around fire balls without explanation, I’ll have to report you,” Julia tells him. “So either you tell me, _orrrrrr_...”

She must roll high on persuasion, because Taako sighs. “Fine, fine. My umbrella tried to kill the grim reaper.”

“Uh, is that a prob--” Julia begins, and then freezes, as she properly _looks_ at his umbrella.

“Yeah, yeah, it’s fine,” Taako says with a wave of his hand. “It does that sometimes. It eats old dead dudes, so sometimes it’s kinda, y’know, erratic.”

That umbrella had been in a number of pictures Bluejeans had shared with her, to validate his story. It had been on the wall in the Director’s office. In every picture, it had always been Lup’s hands. Lup, Taako’s twin sister, whose mysterious disappearance was one of the main catalysts that prompted the Director to wipe the memories of her team.

It doesn’t necessarily mean anything-- maybe Lup just gave her staff to her brother before shevanished, but--

“What _kind of_ stuff has it done?” Julia asks, trying to sound casually curious.

Taako begins to restuff his pockets. “Meh, nothing big. Jumps into my hand, hella useful, destroyed Angus’s macaroons, which was, between you and me, probably for the best, wrote the letters L-U-P on the wall for some reason--”

Julia helps Taako finish cleaning up his stuff, makes an excuse, and bolts.

* * *

“Magnus,” Julia whispers, “I need your help with something.”

“What?”

“I need you to steal Taako’s umbrastaff.”

Magnus’s frowns at her. He’s not opposed from the occasional thievery, but takes his friendships seriously. “Why?”

“It’s for a prank,” Julia says.

Magnus stares at her for a long moment, then breaks into a grin. “Why didn’t you say so?”

* * *

The next morning, while Taako’s taking one of his hour long ‘beauty showers’, Magnus sneaks into the elf’s room. Not long after, Magnus slides back through the door in Julia and Magnus’s own room, gingerly holding the umbrella by its handle. “It zapped me like, three times! This had better be worth it!”

“It will be,” Julia promises.

She wants to open the umbrella, then and there, to prove her suspicions right. But Bluejeans warned about the anti-lich ward. Also, if she’s wrong and this _is_ just a normal magical umbrella, she doesn’t want to be near Taako when he learns she broke it.

So she makes some excuse to Magnus about needing to prep the prank. She gives Avi a different one about needing to get some shopping done, to convince him to prep her transport. Once she arrives landslide, she goes in the opposite direction of shopping and makes a beeline for Barry’s cave. Along the way, the umbrella keeps shocking her, or trying to jump away from her hand, flapping like a caught bird.

“Would you _stop_!” Julia hisses. “I’m trying to help you!”

The umbrella settles.

Once Julia’s sure they’re somewhere far enough from civilization that an evil lich won’t kill anyone, she snaps the umbrella in half with her massive, metal hands.

And she sees Lup, phantasmal and resplendent, wreathed in flames as she billows into the sky. Julia hears the lich’s voice cackle, “YOU’RE THE ROBOT WHO’S BEEN BONING MAGGIE?”

* * *

Lup keeps up a constant chatter while Julia leads the way.

Barry Bluejeans was similar-- speaking almost non-stop once he got started, occasionally stuttering and stammering, apparently carrying on out of a desperate desire to get everything he knew out. Lup is different. Her every word is confident, certain, rolling on like a river.

But there’s a slight desperation to it too, Julia thinks. And a desperation in the way Lup’s body flits back and forth, or how she keeps hovering so close that it feels like a violation of Julia’s personal space, even though the lich has no physical form.

“... What was it like, being stuck in the umbrella?” Julia asks, once she’s decided it’s a safe enough question to ask. Lup really doesn’t seem evil. Just like a slightly more maniacal version of Taako.

In the dark mass that is the lich’s face, two eyes burn like embers. “Fucking _terrible_.”

Julia can imagine. Years and years alone, unable to talk, or move, or have any contact with the outside world at all... Well, she has the experience to say, with certainty, that she’d prefer to be dead.

So Julia’s not going to begrudge Lup having a little bit of trouble with social boundaries.

Nonetheless, she’s glad when they reach Barry, because that man is at least to prepared to begin dealing with his partner’s strangeness. The two liches fly at each other, and there’s a brilliant impact when they embrace, their spectral forms throwing off sparks and flames that fill the entire cave.

It’s sweet. Terrifying, but sweet.

* * *

It takes like, twenty minutes for the undead lovebirds to settle enough to have a proper conversation. But once they do, they settle in around Julia, and the three of them make a _plan_.


	4. Chapter 4

“Hey Jules,” says Magnus, catching his wife by the arm as her robot body rolls down the hall. “I’ve been trying to catch you all day! Where’ve you been?” He lowers his voice to what he considers a whisper. “How’s _the prank_ going?”

“It’s going just absolutely stupendous, Mango,” says the robot, one eye flashing in a wink.

Magnus frowns at her. “Uh… do you have a cold? You sound… different.”

“Robots can’t get colds, silly,” says the robot, this time with Julia’s voice.

“Uh, okay. Probably a good thing, cuz it means I can still do this!” He pecks his wife on the cheek. “Anyway, I’ve gotta go do training for The Director, but I’ll catch you later!”

Magnus runs off, and the robot body sags with relief.

 _You almost blew our cover!_ says Julia.

 _Did not!_ insists Lup.

 _Just let me do the talking, like we planned,_ says Julia.

 _Fine_. Lup crosses the robot’s shared arms.

Julia thinks about sighing really hard. As she starts back down the corridor, she reaches up to touch her cheek. Magnus has no idea he just kissed two people, which is a weird thing to consider.

 _Oh come on_ , says Lup, _Do you really think Magnus hasn’t kissed me before?_

If Julia was a lesser woman, she might have felt jealousy at that. As it is, the only reason she doesn’t is because she can _feel_ the complete lack of romantic or sexual attraction coming from Lup. Sharing a body, their minds aren’t united-- but they are pressed close together, very close, enough that emotions and surface level thoughts are as plain as facial expressions. Julia had felt the joy which soared through Lup when she’d seen Magnus, a wave of platonic affection which had wanted nothing more than to wrap him up in the tightest of hugs.

 _Soon,_ Julia promises. The only reason Lup is hitching a ride in her body is to get past the Lich ward. And once this has all been sorted, Magnus will be able to understand everything.

They just need to wait for Bluejean’s distraction.

When it hits, they don’t know what it is-- just that it’s _big_. The whole moon base tilts, and shouting starts up in the distance. Lup cackles.

Julia hopes Bluejeans won’t hurt anybody.

 _He won’t_ , says Lup, offhandedly, already piloting their body quickly down the corridor towards The Director’s office.

Behind the well-crafted mahogany desk is the enchanted portrait of the Starblaster crew. Past that, a hallway; past that, a chamber equipped with a devious puzzle designed to block all passage. Barry had drilled them intensively on how to solve it. Or, well, he had drilled Julia, mostly. Lup had kept alternating between playing footy with his spectral form, and cleaning her nails, which was particularly annoying since her body was composed out of black smoke.

But the puzzle isn’t there.

Before Julia can even feel annoyed she put all that practice to waste, Julia begins trying to detect magic. Nothing _feels_ amiss, but still, it just seems weird that there wouldn’t be something here to block the way--

 _Oh come_ **_on_** , Lup says, and pulls their body along.

Said body immediately sinks to the floor, and then--

- _The air is filled with ash and smoke. There is screaming outside, and the barking of the dogs, all an ugly clamour, she can barely see_ \--

- _Dark, dark, it’s just dark, no sight, no touch, no nothing_ \--

\- _“Dad?” Julia cries. “Dad, no, forget the workshop, we have to go!”_ \--

\- _“Barry?” Lup cries, and thank Pan, she’s remembered how to talk, she can still talk. She knows they can’t hear her, but she still cries, “Taako? Come on, bro! Davenport, Merle, Lucretia, anyone?”_ \--

\- _A rumble through the ground, crashing, everyone’s screaming, everyone’s running, but they’re not going to get away in time_ -

- _But there’s no answer. Lup’s alone, along, trapped in her own stupid staff, no one’s ever going to find her_ -

 _Lup?_ Thinks Julia. Lup wasn’t there when Raven’s Roost was destroyed.

 _… Julia?_ Thinks Lup in response. Nobody was there with her in the umbra staff. Nobody at all.

The illusion dissolves. It was cleverly woven to tailor for its targets worst fears, but it wasn’t designed for two souls pressed so closely together. The visions cancel each other out. The pair of women find themselves back in their shared robot body, lying on the floor of the enchanted chamber.

“Fuck,” they both say, in unison.

For several long moments they don’t move, too busy regaining their composure. Also, Lup has an iron grip on her corporeal form, spurred by the fear of being body-less again. Which wouldn’t be a problem, if she hadn’t also temporarily forgotten how bodies work. Julia very gently pries control back, and stands up.

They can’t wait any longer. There’s an alarm ringing. The Director could show up any time. If that’s the kind of magic she can weave, Julia doesn’t want to meet her in an actual duel.

 _She’s pretty badass, yeah_ , says Lup, filled with affection and admiration. _But don’t worry, babe. I’m badass-ier._

Julia shakes their head as she hurries on.

Then there’s a door. A big door. And a thick wall. Lup throws some flames at them. It doesn’t do much more than leave scorch marks behind.

 _Shit_ , thinks Lup.

There’s a keypad on the door. Julia types in ‘Password123’ and ‘Swordfish’. Neither of them work.

 _Well of fucking course they won’t_ , says Lup. _She’s a hyper-intelligent intergalactic astronaut and chronicler, did you really think she’d be so stupid to make her password ‘password’?!_

 _Well I don’t know!_ Julia snaps back. _You lived with for her for a hundred years, what do_ **_you_ ** _think her password is?_

_I don’t know!_

_There’s gotta be something-- an important name, or a birthday, or number--_

All Julia feels is a wave of frustration from Lup-- and then the buzz of an idea. The lich types in the a number: 32, 41, 000.

It works.

As their body rushes into the private chamber, Julia knows it probably doesn’t matter. But she can’t still help but ask: _What was that number?_

_Number of people on our Homeworld when the Hunger ate it._

Julia answers with wordless horror.

 _Yeah_  says Lup. _Kinda morbid, right? Lucretia was sorta obsessed with it. I only ever bothered to read her first few journals, but she referred to that little stat constantly..._

 _Bit hypocritical of a lich to accuse someone_ else _of being morbid_ , says Julia, but that was only to cover the fact that, yikes. A number that big hardly even seems real.

And that was only one world that the Hunger ate. How many others? At least another 98, and the liches said that they had no clue how many planes had fallen before the Starblaster’s escape.

It’s a good thing that robot bodies can’t shiver.

Lup pay’s Julia’s existential horror no mind; no doubt she’d gotten numb to that over the decades. Instead, her attention is focused on the tank in the secret office’s corner. In it floats a small, glowing, aquatic form. A second void fish, just like Barry Bluejeans had theorised.

Most of Julia’s remaining doubts evaporate.

Working together, the pair of them manage to pull the creature out of its tank. It’s easier said than done. The little void fish’s tentacles wrap everywhere, clinging to their body, to the side of the tank, to little wooden ducks. It’s scared; the robot is a complete stranger, and it’s probably never been out of that tank for years

Magnus would probably know what to do. He’d always had such animal handling aptitude. With the right type of hug or tone of voice, he’d have the void fish cuddling him seconds.

While Julia may not be her husband, she certainly picked up some things from him over the years. She begins humming a calming tune, one of the ones her Dad would sing for her when she was a kid, sick and up late with some terrible fever.

 _Don’t blame me if the entire planet forgets that now,_  Lup quips, but Julia can feel the approval beneath her words.

The music seems to relax the creature, which begins to pulse with a pale purple light. Soon, the voidfish is in a water-proof sack in their backpack, and they have 10 vials filled with their ichor. They head out, the alarm still ringing in their microphones.

They get it no far than the Director’s official chambers before they’re stopped.

Stopped by, of all people, Angus McDonald.

“Ms Julia?” he says, in a young, warbling voice, wand pointed at them. “W-what are you doing?”

“Ango?” says Julia, her husband’s nickname for the boy slipping out. “This- it’s not what it looks like.”

“It looks at though you broke into and raided the Madame Director’s private quarters!”

“Okay, it’s exactly what it looks like.” That’s all Lup.  “But you two still don’t know what’s going on.”

Two? It’s only then that Julia notices a second figure standing a little behind Angus. It’s Davenport; eyes wide, ears twitching, a confused, almost _pained_ expression on his face.

“Davenport!” he squeaks.

“You scared Davenport!” Angus squeaks. “And- and I know you’ve been up to something weird! You’ve been sneaking around everywhere, and I know you’re the one who stole Taako’s umbrella, and there’s a lich attacking the moon base, and you’re going to tell me what’s going on _right now_!”

“Okay.” Lup shrugs.

Julia feels the arms of her robotic body raise. She doesn’t even get the chance to ask Lup what she’s about to do; the magic just explodes out of them like a burst of fire.

She screams-- not Ango, he’s just a kid, this was a horrible mistake--

\-- but the fire, it turns out, is harmless. The wand is thrown out of Angus’s hands, as his body is wrapped in flames. They don't burn him, but hold him as securely as ropes. He struggles against them, but fails to break free.

“Sorry, kid,” says Lup. “‘Bout this. And the macaroons.”

“W-what?”

But already Lup’s attention is wholly focused on Davenport. The poor gnome looks terrified, and deeply confused… but he’s not running. He glances between the robot and kid. He doesn’t know much, but he knows that he doesn’t want Angus hurt.

Balling his fists up, Davenport throws a punch at the robot.

Julia’s the one who grabs the punch.  She’s had the body longer. She’s able to do it without hurting him.

Lup’s the one who gets him to drink the ichor. He protests, untrusting, trying to spit the liquid out. But Lup’s voice is coaxing as she says, “Come on, Dav, it’s vintage…”

Somehow, that convinces him.

He drinks.

He shudders.

Ears twitching, tail lashing, Julia sets him gently on the floor. It’s… pretty horrible to watch. Like someone waking up from a nightmare, only in slow motion.

“Dav- Daven… Davenport--” he chokes, and chokes, “I’m Davenport-” His eyes clear, he looks around, as if seeing everything again. Angus is screaming at him to run. That catches his attention. His entire posture shifts. He stands straight and tall, filled with direction and determination. Brow furrowed in anger, he demands, “What’s going on here? Who are you?’

“Hey Cap’n Port” Lup grins. “Can’t you recognise me?”

It’s like the sun coming out from behind a dark cloud. “... Lup?’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *rubs neck*
> 
> So yeah... I got... busy...
> 
> But hey, I got some really lovely comments, and that encouraged me to finally finish this chapter off! So thanks, folks :)


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